Today John Pitts's family in Kirkby spoke of their grief after the decision was taken to switch off his life support machine.

The 45-year-old father of two suffered severe head injuries during the incident at his local social club just over a week ago.

For the past 15 years he had been living in the Sussex village of Uckfield.

His sister Sandra White, 37, a mother-of-three from Northwood, Kirkby, said: "John was a quiet, friendly man and a good dad.

"It's just hard to take in that his young kids have no dad now and we don't know why."

Last week a post-mortem confirmed Mr Pitts died of head injuries and police launched a murder inquiry.

Mr Pitts, a hotel worker originally from Westvale, Kirkby, was father to Kirsty, 13, and Kieran, 10.

Mr Pitts's wife Sarah, who the ECHO understands lost her first husband during a fight, was with him when he was attacked.

Mrs White said: "John and Sarah were in the social club just having a relaxing evening.

"She is just totally traumatised at the moment. It's worse what she's going through because she lost her first husband in similar circumstances.

"The whole family were supposed to be coming up to stay with us in Merseyside next month. We'd planned what we were going to do.

"Watching John's life support machine get switched off was so hard. The doctors said he wasn't responding to brain stem tests and that he'd been dead when he came in really. It's heartbreaking.

"I'm just hoping whoever did this to John is caught and locked up. John was not the type to get into a fight, he'd never been in trouble in his life."

Sussex police are still investigating the incident at Wadhurst Social Club at 12am on Friday August 4. A spokesman said: "The investigation is in the early stages and police are trying to establish the exact circumstances of the incident."